


Thinking About The Past

by TatteredTeddy



Category: Biohazard | Resident Evil (Gameverse)
Genre: Eventual Fluff, F/M, Grieving, Trauma, in this house we stan supportive and understanding relationships
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-13
Updated: 2021-01-13
Packaged: 2021-03-18 02:41:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,441
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28735890
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TatteredTeddy/pseuds/TatteredTeddy
Summary: Glenn Arias is thinking about the past as the anniversary of a traumatic day approaches. Kali Sarah... no, just Kali... wants to help him through the day.
Relationships: Glenn Arias/Original Female Character(s)
Kudos: 5





	Thinking About The Past

“Hey… Glenn, sweetie, what’s on your mind?”  
  
A pair of sleepy hazel eyes glances up at me. My sweetheart has been lost in thought for quite a while now. He’s been like this for the past few days, actually, quiet and vaguely sad, almost shut-off but not quite. “I’ve just been thinking about the past quite a lot lately,” he says, a million deeper understandings filling his words with a bitter aftertaste. “It’s coming close to the anniversary of that day once again.”  
  
“I’m sorry, sweetie.” I sit down next to him and wrap my arm around his shoulders. He’s much taller and has a wider frame than I do, but I can still manage to give him those little side-hugs. “I know that I could never understand how that feels, but if you need anything, I’m here, okay?”  
  
“I don’t want to make you uncomfortable though… I know it’s a lot to deal with.”  
  
“I studied to help people who are struggling like you are, you know. It’s better to talk about it than to bottle it up.”  
  
He looks up at the ceiling, and then back down at his lap. “I know. I just… I feel guilty still thinking about it. I love you, and I know you know that, but it still hurts to lose a first love in such a way. I lost everyone else too that day… not just Sarah.” He’d told me a bit about this before: the day his wedding was attacked by a drone strike back when he first got involved in the bioweapons market. He lost his wife, his family, nearly everyone he cared about. He’d mentioned it to me before, but he never seemed to want to bring it up until just now.  
  
“I understand, sweetheart. It's gonna be okay. You can always make more friends and bring more loved ones into your life.” My voice trembles with worry over him. Losing everyone, friends, family, and his first love, on his wedding day all those years ago… how could someone ever recover from that sort of thing? “And you don’t have to worry about missing Sarah. Grieving someone you were so close to is totally normal. I won’t get jealous or feel inferior or anything, I promise. You’re allowed to feel whatever you’re feeling.”  
  
“I just…” He sighs and buries his face in his hands. I can hear him trying not to cry. I’ve heard that sound from him before, the shaky breaths that he tries to control but he just can’t. “I can’t get that image out of my head. How do I get rid of the feeling of her blood all over me…”  
  
“It takes time. A lot more time than most things will take. But you can make it until then. I’ve got you. You have a second chance now, remember?” I gently nudge the top of his head. “Hey, lemme see your face. I like when I can see you.”  
  
He slowly looks up at me, and I instantly recognize the shimmer of tears in his eyes. “You shouldn’t have to see me like this…”  
  
“It’s okay if you cry, you know. Here… close your eyes.”  
  
Glenn closes his eyes and a single tear rolls down his cheek. I pull the sleeve of my sweater up over my hand and gently dry it away, kissing where the watery trail had been before. “There. All better,” I whisper, my lips brushing against his cheek.  
  
“This is why I love you.” A shaky smile crosses his face. “Anyone else would have just become bitter and jealous because I’m still grieving her. But you understand. You would never go accusing me of all the things I fear that I’m doing.”  
  
“What are you scared of doing?”  
  
He hesitates for a second before speaking. “I… I don’t want you to think you’re just a replacement for Sarah.”  
  
I pull my hand back out from the end of my sleeve and gently place it on his cheek. My fingertips trace over the tiny bit of stubble on top of his surprisingly soft skin. “You’ve never made me feel like a replacement,” I reassure him. “If anything… it makes me happy that I can help you.”  
  
“You’re alright with that?” he asks. “I don’t ever want you to feel like a replacement.” A glimmer of happiness sparkles in his eyes. He’s the only person I ever want to make eye contact with. I could stare into his eyes forever.  
  
“Yes, of course I’m okay with that. I mean, these aren’t just your second chances, you know. These are my first chances. I mean, I’ve had little relationships before, but this is… my first real love. So don’t worry, okay? I’ll never feel like this is just for your personal gain. Because you make me happy too.”  
  
“Can I confess something?” Glenn asks, pulling me back into reality from the lovestruck trance I was dangerously close to slipping into.  
  
“Of course. What is it?”  
  
“I’ve been having this thought, that maybe… the second time around, my wedding could be even better. But there’s this nagging fear that it’ll be a repeat of the first one, and I’ll lose you too.”  
  
My lips purse into a tiny pout and I shake my head at him. “No, don’t… don’t say that. Those people don’t want you dead anymore, you know. Those stupid authorities who think they can do whatever they want. You’re safe from them now, you know.”  
  
“I know, but I still find myself looking up at the sky, expecting something to come falling down that’ll kill me and destroy everything around me.” He looks up at the ceiling and back down again. “I know it’s just the trauma that makes me feel this way, but I still can’t stop doing it.”  
  
“You’re safe in here. I promise, nothing will happen to us now. And if you ever need another reminder, you can always let me know.” I lean in and kiss his forehead, right above the scar that crosses through his eyebrow. “Hey… you need a hug?”  
  
Without even replying, he pulls me into a tight embrace. He’s always so warm, it’s like I’m hugging a hot water bottle. I can feel him relaxing into me, his inner tension dissolving as his hand gently runs though my hair. I close my eyes and rest my head on his shoulder. I could just stay here forever. This is home: not a place or a city, but being in Glenn’s arms. He feels like what home is supposed to feel like. “It’ll be okay,” I whisper. “We can make it happen and everything will be okay. It’ll be a perfect wedding.”  
  
“You seem like the type to dream about the perfect wedding all the time. You were that type of girl when you were little, weren’t you?” he teases.  
  
“Maybe…” I admit. “I always liked those Disney princess movies where they got married and it was happily ever after.”  
  
“A lover of Disney princesses… of course you were. I’m sure my princess would love all the flowers the world could give us, wouldn’t you?” His usual lighthearted tone has returned to his voice. And what a perfect voice it is, too.  
  
“You know me too well. I love any kind of flowers. You had all different colors of them, didn’t you? I vaguely remember seeing those flowers before.” It was during the situation involving that professor, but that’s something we don’t talk about anymore. That was before we were official, and that time in his life wasn’t exactly his best. “Spring colors, right? Lots of pastels.”  
  
I can almost see the mental pictures of the flowers in that disastrous wedding flashing through his mind. “Yes, we did. Spring colors for a spring wedding. You would have loved the scent of the flowers in the air. But the two of us can have something so much better… I promise. It’ll be perfect. You deserve nothing less than perfection.”  
  
I pick up on that sad and distant look in his eyes before he even notices it’s there. “You’re thinking about bad memories again. I can tell. You look like you need some cuddles so you don’t have to think about the bad things, sweet bean.”  
  
“How could I say no to you? You always know just what I need.”  
  
I comfortably settle into his lap and he drapes his arm over me, providing a soft pressure stimulation that just makes me melt against him. “I just wanna make you happy,” I sigh softly. “That’s the most important thing in the world to me.”  
  
“You make me the happiest man I could ever be. I never thought I’d feel joy again after seeing all my loved ones die, but you have given so much back to me that I never would have had otherwise. I am just…” He sighs and leans back, tilting his head back towards the ceiling. “I’m so lucky that you came to heal me and my heart.”  
  
“I’m not healing you all by myself, you know. You’re healing yourself too. And you’re doing such a good job, too~!!! Look at you, getting all sweet about pretty wedding flowers. You do understand it deep inside, that you’ll get a second chance and this time it’ll be perfect..”  
  
“I guess you’re right…” he says with a soft smile. “That’s because I want to have a perfect wedding with you.” He twirls a strand of my hair around his finger. It’s like he’s playing with it for me, since I’m well past the stage of my life where playing with my hair was the cute thing for girls to do. “You’d look beautiful with flowers braided into your hair, you know.”  
  
“I’ve never tried it before. I bet it would look pretty cool, though. Like a fairy princess.” My inner child loves the idea of being a fairy princess. That’s two of the prettiest things someone can be compared to, after all.  
  
“Someday I’ll put flowers in your hair. And someday… I’ll be able to call you my wife. That’s a promise you can take with you forever.”  
  
“Maybe I’ll make you a flower crown too. So we can match. You’ll look like the king of the fairy kingdom.”  
  
His face absolutely lights up at this prospect. Even someone like him who’s done horrible things and who’s been driven by his traumas for such a long time just wants to be a fairy king sometimes. It’s beautiful, how the world works like that. “So does that mean you will be my fairy queen?” he asks.  
  
“Of course I will. And this time it’ll all be perfect, I promise. We can have flowers everywhere. You’ll even get a flower crown of your own.”  
  
I can see an idea formulating in his head. A small smile crosses his face as he thinks about whatever’s on his mind. “My angel… what if I got you flowers right now?”  
  
“Right now~?” I repeat.  
  
“Yes, of course. I think you deserve them.”  
  
“Me? I deserve them? Sweetie, if anyone, you deserve the flowers. You’re so strong for being able to talk about the wedding, you know. You’re doing so well with it. You don’t even know how proud I am of you.”  
  
He clicks his tongue and shakes his head at me. “No, no. Let me spoil you, my princess. It makes me feel better to shower you with everything you could ever ask for.”  
  
“Aww, if you insist.” I puff out my cheeks like a pouty child. That’s so typical of Glenn, to spoil me to make himself feel better.  
  
“Let’s go now, dear. We can walk there together.”  
  
He lifts me up with him as he stands up, quite possibly just to show off that he can lift me as easily as lifting a feather. Before I’m set down on the ground, my eyes drift over to his temptingly kissable lips and I steal a quick kiss. The feeling of his stubble against my cheek still tingles for a few seconds after. “You need to shave, silly,” I tease.  
  
“I’ll do that soon. But I think you like how it feels now, don’t you?”  
  
“Maybe.”  
  
He leads me out the door, glancing back to see me following him like a duckling with my hands in my pockets and my eyes locked on him. His strides take a bit of effort for me and my much shorter legs to keep up with. Once I catch up to him, he takes my hand and squeezes it tightly. “I almost forgot how little you are. It takes quite some work to catch up with me, doesn’t it?”  
  
“Hey, I’m not that little!” I insist. “I’m just a foot shorter than you!”  
  
“Just a foot shorter, dear? You’re adorable.”  
  
After a few minutes of me trying to prove that I can in fact keep up with him and his height advantage, we arrive at a small florist’s stand and he steps back away from the rows of premade bouquets so I can choose one. I hesitate to choose at first, but the choice becomes clear when I spot a bundle of pale pink lilies, seemingly waiting for me to pick them up. I lift them from the display and proudly show them off to Glenn. “Aren’t they pretty?”  
  
“They’re almost as beautiful as you, dear. Would you like them?”  
  
I nod my head enthusiastically, making my hair bounce around my face. “Mhm~!”  
  
I clutch the bouquet tightly, gently examining the petals and leaning in to smell the flowers as Glenn pays for them. He seems to be talking to the florist too, as they occasionally look back at me, both of them sporting that sweet smile that he always has when he’s admiring me. When he comes back over to me, I give him an inquisitive look. “What were you talking about~?” I giggle.  
“Oh, I was just telling the florist how precious you are, and how someday I want to marry you. What, can’t I show off my most prized treasure?”  
  
I let out a squeal of embarrassment and hide my face behind the flowers. “Stop being so sweet!”  
  
Glenn looks behind the flowers at me, a teasing smile on his face. “I won’t stop that. I enjoy being too sweet, because then you do that. Should we head back now, so I can tease my angel in the privacy of our own home?”  
  
“Well, now if you say it like that, it sounds dirty!” I whine. “But sure. I could use some cuddling up on the couch… and I bet you could too.”


End file.
